Lady Bridget's Diary(21)

“Is everything all right?” Rupert was definitely not himself tonight; something was obviously wrong.

“It’s Frederick. He’s been hurt. There was a fight.” His brother was clearly anxious to rush off to his old friend.

“Is there anything I can do?” Darcy asked.

“Yes. Dance with Lady Bridget.”

And with that Rupert rushed off.



Darcy found himself doing the unthinkable: entering a ballroom with the intention of seeking out Lady Bridget. He had, in fact, made it a point to do exactly the opposite because the woman did things to him and to his state of equilibrium that he did not care for.

But Rupert had asked him a favor. Feeling guilty for that offhanded comment about the money, and wanting to help his brother in what was clearly a distressing situation, Darcy had found himself agreeing. Well, he hadn’t exactly had an opportunity to disagree, what with Rupert running off like that.

Thus here he was, standing before her.

“Good evening, Lady Bridget,” he said, because it was polite and he was nothing if not polite.

“Good evening, Lord Darcy,” she said graciously. She did not draw out the ooo’s. No, she spoke like the duchess was succeeding in her attempts to turn her into a proper young English lady. “I don’t suppose you have seen Rupert.”

She called him Rupert. Not Mr. Wright. This suggested an intimacy between them that Darcy didn’t care for.

“I have. He had to depart unexpectedly. He sends his regrets.”

Lady Bridget heaved a sigh, which he mainly noted due to the dramatic rise and fall of her breasts. Of course he looked, briefly. He might be a gentleman, but he wasn’t dead. He definitely wasn’t dead, owing to the pulse-­pounding way his body reacted to her.

Then she gazed down at the dance card dangling from her wrist.

“He owes you a waltz.”

“He doesn’t owe me anything. But he did promise and I have been looking forward to it.”

The words he uttered next were not spoken lightly. He told himself it was his duty as a gentleman not to leave her idling like a wallflower; he ought to ask her to waltz. If anyone asked, and they would, he would explain that he was simply standing in for his notoriously distracted brother.

He didn’t want to dance—­he hated dancing. But even he had a hard time denying the desire to touch her, and he had been presented with the perfect opportunity to do so, without it meaning anything.

“Would you like to dance?”

“Of course I’d like to, but my dance partner is missing.”

He exhaled shortly, frustrated. She misunderstood him. He ground out the words, “Would you like to dance with me?”

“It’s not that I wish to dance for the exercise or because I am bored standing on the sidelines,” she explained, while scanning the room for her desired dance partner. “It’s just that I wish to dance with Rupert.”

“Right.”

Darcy gritted his jaw. He had just been rejected. By Lady Bridget, of the American Cavendishes. The only thing more mortifying was that he had, for a brief, shining moment, looked forward to the prospect of holding her with something like anticipation. This was exactly why feelings of all sorts were to be ruthlessly ignored.

And he had been rejected in favor of Rupert, who was off doing God knew what with God only knew whom.

Maddening, that.

“But it’s very good and honorable of you to offer to stand up in his stead.” She smiled sweetly at him and patted his arm, as if he were a small child. It was so bloody ladylike of her, and that saddened him. They were changing her, from an exuberant creature into one who was polished and refined, and who lauded honorable behavior. It was the same thing they’d done to him. “You are such a gentleman, Lord Darcy.”

Except right now, he didn’t want to be a gentleman. In fact, if he dared to examine the state of his emotions, he would find that what he wanted was to pull her against him, claim her mouth for a deep kiss, sink his hands into her hair. He wanted to thoroughly and utterly ravish her until she would say, breathlessly, Rupert who?

Of course that was completely unacceptable and exactly why he made a point of avoiding her or at the very least avoiding anything that wasn’t a reasoned and rational thought.

And then he spoke in haste, words spoken from a place of hurt and words he regretted the second he gave voice to them.

“I would think that even you are aware that young ladies are not supposed to refuse a gentleman’s offer to dance.”

Her eyes flashed with anger. He might as well have said, Or you would know that if you weren’t raised on a horse farm.

Her cheeks reddened considerably.

“I am very well aware, thank you,” she said so sharply, he almost felt as if he’d been stabbed. “As I am also aware that a lady must honor what is written on her dance card. So you see, I am in an impossible position due to your stupid rules.”